the pathways of her muddled mind were too tangled and meandering, and she tapped her walking cane with impatience.
Her sisters regarded her cautiously.
‘Veronica!’ Miss Celandine trilled, dashing over to the armchair. ‘Do have a pancake, or would you like me to read you a story?’
Miss Veronica ignored her. ‘But weren’t there two of them?’ she muttered under her breath, trying to wade through the neglected memories. ‘I’m sure there were.’
Still clutching the claw in her hand, Miss Ursula glared at Edie. ‘Have you told me the truth, child?’ she demanded fretfully. ‘Did you really see this creature in the museum last night?’
The girl backed away. Miss Ursula was usually so composed and controlled, to see her afraid was startling and distressing.
‘Answer me, Edith!’ the woman snapped, seizing her by the arm.
Edie nodded resolutely and Miss Ursula drew a horrified breath.
‘Then I can only hope you are mistaken,’ she hissed. ‘It is too soon... too soon. Nothing is prepared, we are not ready! Can the hour I have long dreaded be here already? Have I been caught out at the last?’
Casting a final, fearful glance at the confused figure in the armchair, the eldest of the Websters whirled about and hurried quickly from the room.
Miss Celandine scowled at Edie. ‘You mustn’t upset us so,’ she chided. ‘Fancy mentioning the ravens, and in front of Veronica too. See how agitated you’ve made her. Veronica, speak to me, Veronica.’
Edie wanted to run after Miss Ursula, but even as she hastened to the entrance her quick, capricious mind had already decided against it.
If she was caught spying there was no telling what might happen. Of the three Webster sisters, Miss Ursula was the most formidable and Edie knew she had to be wary in her presence. The other two seemed much easier to handle – perhaps she could learn what she needed from them.
Sitting beside the armchair, the girl looked at Miss Celandine’s ripe wrinkly, walnut-like features framed by her straw coloured plaits, and Miss Veronica’s haggard, overly made-up face.
‘Why is Ursula so scared?’ she asked.
Neither of the Websters replied. Miss Veronica seemed to have drifted off into her own world again and Miss Celandine was nibbling her lip as if wondering what to do.
‘There’s some things even you can’t be told,’ Miss Celandine eventually blurted. ‘I thought you were here to look after us but that hasn’t happened at all – quite the opposite. It is, it is! Well, I shan’t say anything to you unless Ursula tells me to – and Veronica won’t either.’
But her words did not deter Edie. Apparently unconcerned, she lifted the plate of pancakes and sniffed them experimentally.
‘Put them down!’ Miss Celandine squealed. ‘They’re not yours, they’re not, they’re not!’
Impudently Edie arched her eyebrows and proceeded to stuff two of the pancakes into her mouth, much to Miss Celandine’s outrage.
‘Wicked!’ she clucked, beating her fists upon her knees. ‘You stop that! At once, at once – ooh, you naughty child. You are, you are!’
Edie ignored her and looked instead at Veronica who was also staring at her in shocked disbelief as yet another pancake disappeared inside the young girl’s mouth.
Suddenly the woman in the armchair could bear it no longer. Yowling like a singed cat, she grabbed the plate from Edie and rammed its scrumptious jam-daubed dainties into her own crabbed lips.
Several minutes passed as Miss Veronica chewed and devoured her most favourite food. Then when the last morsel was swallowed, she frowned at Edie and poked her with a bony finger.
‘There were two ravens,’ she said, her eyes glazing over as she struggled to recall the fleeting memories. ‘Two of them, and they belonged to someone... someone very special. What were their names? Why don’t I know? I’m sure it’s important.’
Leaning back in the chair, the elderly woman sighed heavily and shook her head.
‘You are shameless,’ Miss Celandine berated Edie. ‘Poor Veronica mustn’t remember, you mustn’t make her.’
The girl eyed her mutinously. Perhaps if she asked about something else she could catch her off guard. ‘Tell me what happened to the land of Askar,’ she piped up unexpectedly.
At the mention of that name Miss Celandine brightened, but she glanced suspiciously at the doorway in case Miss Ursula was lurking there. ‘Come,’ she whispered, ‘over here – we’ll sit by the fireplace.’
Together they rose, and Miss Celandine settled herself in one of the chairs by the hearth and raked a poker through the cold, dead ashes as if stoking a heap of flaming cinders.
Edie waited until she had finished before she said, ‘Ursula started tellin’ me yesterday about the ice giants. Did they build the bridge and kill the World Tree?’
Miss Celandine brushed the ash and coal dust from her fingers and gazed mournfully at the charred, scattered cinders.
‘Oh, yes,’ she murmured. ‘The chasm that separated the green lands from the icy wastes was spanned. Oh, but it was so heavenly in those days. Askar was at its most beautiful and Yggdrasill at the height of its power and majesty. It really was glorious – oh, it was, it was.
‘Everyone looked so handsome and attractive then, the gentlemen were tall and dashing. Oh what dances we had, what a delicious time.’
Miss Celandine’s voice trailed off as she slipped into a delightful reverie and Edie had to nudge her to continue.
‘What about the giants?’ she urged.
Miss Celandine’s goofy grin disappeared. ‘I don’t want to talk about them,’ she snapped. ‘Mayn’t I only remember the nice bits?’
‘No.’
‘You’re as beastly as Ursula,’ the elderly woman bleated. ‘Very well.
‘When those terrible ice lords first stepped upon the shores of the fertile lands, they saw in the distance the wondrous light of the World Tree and knew in their black hearts that they could never hope to attack it. Spanning the chasm had weakened them dreadfully. So, at the edge of the green realm they quarrelled about what to do, until their leader – the tallest and proudest of them, who wore a crown of icicles upon his big head, was so disgusted at their cowardice that he stormed off on his own.
‘Over the pretty hillsides he rampaged, drawing ever closer to the emerald shadows of Yggdrasill and when at last he reached the lowest and most outlying of boughs, he leapt up and swung his great axe.’
Miss Celandine drew her breath and covered her mouth as she let the tragedy of those words imprint themselves upon the intrigued child.
‘Hacked it clear through that monster did!’ she uttered sadly. ‘The world shuddered, as did we all, and after that the sun never seemed to shine quite as brightly again. A horrendous shiver travelled through the great ash, from its topmost leaves to the bottommost root and suddenly we were all afraid.’
‘Is that when the tree died?’ Edie asked breathlessly.
Miss Celandine ran her fingers through the stained and ragged lace that fringed her velvet gown before answering. ‘No,’ she said simply. ‘Only the bough was hewn, the ogre could do no more damage, for the massive branch toppled right down on top of him and broke his frozen head to bits. Served him right it did, but that was no comfort to us. The World Tree was injured and we did not know how to heal it.
‘Oh, the poor thing. Three days it took for the people of the city to ride about the trunk to where the sap seeped from that hideous gash. I couldn’t look, it was Ursula and our mother who went with a company of guards. Veronica was